1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of protective garments and specifically to a collar enclosure that allows for quick and easy securing to the wearer's neck.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Protective garments are used in medical settings to cover patients and health care workers alike to isolate the patients from ambient germs found on practitioners' clothing and to isolate practitioners from germs and fluids from patients.
Typically a protective garment is disposable, but some are not. In use, the user places his or her arms through the sleeves and then the gown is secured around the neck with a tie, VELCRO® or sticky tape as well as around the wearer's waist with a tie.
Tying the collar portion of the protective garment can be cumbersome and time-consuming. Sometimes, the securing of the ties around the neck is not completely successful or not done at all. As a result, the gown can come open causing the shoulders to droop off of the wearer at inopportune times, thereby exposing both the patient and health care worker each to the other.
A recent development in attempting to solve this problem has involved the use of a bib-like device that goes over the head of the wearer. This device suffers because it musses hair and the sticky tabs can get caught in the hair.
There exists, therefore, a need for an improved method of securing the collar around the neck of a health care worker other than the methods found in the prior art.